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February 12, 2012

Court: Our animals can't sue us for freedom

Critics are quick to pounce on judges that try to take away our rights. So we should compliment the ones who rule to maintain our rights.

In this case it's the right of humans to not be sued by animals. The story is in USAToday.com which tells us that PETA attempted to use a technicality to get a ruling that the whales at Seaworld were being held in violation of the 13th Amendment which says:

Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

The authors and everyone who voted for ratification of the amendment in 1865 thought it was supposed to apply to human slavery. That was so well understood at the time that they didn't think it necessary to spell it out in any more detail. Can you imagine the reaction back then if someone suggested it might someday be applied to animals?

That didn't stop PETA which went to court to try to squeeze whales through the loophole. Fortunately, the court ruled against them, and the unintended consequences of a bad ruling were avoided.

Otherwise, courthouses would be full of household pets suing their owners for freedom, or maybe just for better conditions. Dogs probably wouldn't sue. But cats? I'm not so sure.

Plaintiff, Fluffy, hereby sues Owner due to the fact that Owner, in a cruel and inhuman manner, forced Fluffy to choose between dried cat food and starvation when in fact Owner could very easily afford fresh salmon.